


Knowing What's in Your Head

by katopiyo



Series: Evens Month 2020 [2]
Category: Gundam Wing
Genre: Childhood Friends, Earth-born AU, Evens Month 2020, Gen, M/M, Scrapped title: "Wagon :]"
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-01
Updated: 2020-08-01
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:35:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,366
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25645906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katopiyo/pseuds/katopiyo
Summary: Duo's hiding something. Quatre is nosy. Childhood friends AU.
Relationships: Duo Maxwell & Quatre Raberba Winner, Duo Maxwell/Quatre Raberba Winner
Series: Evens Month 2020 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1859044
Kudos: 3





	Knowing What's in Your Head

**Author's Note:**

> For Evens Month week 1.  
> Duo and Quatre are childhood friends, raised on Earth. They're somewhere in their younger teens. Quatre is brattier than usual.  
> Built from the keywords “confession,” “favorite food,” “hands,” “moon,” “habit,” “midnight,” “sleepover,” and “nature.”  
> Contains one reference to the voice cassettes.

Something was weird.

It’s summer vacation, which usually meant Quatre and Duo would spend every second humanly possible with one another - more than they already did during the school year. But Duo was spending days out at Mr. G and Mr. Howard’s - Duo’s dad’s friends’ house. And then Duo’d spend days cooped up in the detached garage, and Mrs. Maxwell insisted that Duo was too busy to hang out for the day. She wouldn’t tell him anything about what Duo was doing until he practically begged her, and even then, all she said was that it was something Duo didn’t want him to see yet. Quatre didn’t press any further because he could see that she felt bad, and he figured Duo’d done his damnedest to keep her from saying anything at all.

Today was the first day in about two weeks in which Quatre actually got to spend the whole day with Duo, and they were having a sleepover to make up for lost time. But Duo still wasn’t paying any real attention to him. Duo’s thoughts were directed somewhere that wasn’t here - to someone or something that Quatre didn’t know of - and truth be told, he was growing a little irritated. 

Duo was so out of it that he nearly crashed his bike into a tree on their usual cycling route, and he didn’t even blink when Mrs. Maxwell brought out fried shrimp for dinner - and fried shrimp was supposed to be his favorite food. So much so, in fact, that when they had it, he’d usually try to snatch Quatre’s portion off of his plate. But for the first time in years, Duo ate quietly at the dinner table with almost perfect manners - manners that likely could have rivaled Quatre’s had Duo been raised in the same stuffy environment full of overly image-conscious rich people.

The sun was long gone, having sunk below the horizon hours ago. Leisurely, clouds crawled over the midnight moon and across the sparkling ultramarine sky.

The two of them were relaxing after dinner in the fenced yard between the house and the Maxwells’ tiny church. Quatre was lounging in the big wooden bench swing, sipping on some of Mrs. Maxwell’s homemade lemonade, while Duo sat beside him, gazing beyond the stars to somewhere further out in space. Or at least, that’s what it looked like to Quatre.

For once in their lives, Quatre was the one doing most of the talking while Duo sat there and nodded, or made a noise to let Quatre know that he was listening, or occasionally offered a comment or counterpoint to Quatre’s philosophical musings. But Quatre was starting to run out of material, so they’d sat quietly, the songs of owls and crickets in the distance accompanied by the breeze blowing through the trees and the sound of cars passing through the neighborhood streets.

Being with a weirdly quiet and annoyingly secretive Duo was at least better than being alone at home, Quatre thought, but it all still rubbed him the wrong way. He wasn’t about to let this be the worst sleepover they’d ever had.

“Duo,” Quatre sets his paper cup down somewhere where he won’t accidentally knock it over, then turns to look at his best friend.

“Hm?” Duo sounds, tilting his head to look back at him.

“You’re acting weird again,” Quatre frowns. “What’s wrong?”

“That’s the third time you’ve asked me that today,” Duo gives him an exasperated look. “I’m fine, okay? See?” he gestures. 

Quatre firmly, but gently grabs one of Duo’s hands, then looks directly into the braided boy’s eyes. 

“Explain this then,” he demands, fingers grazing over fabric bandages. “What happened that put your hands in this shape?”

“I fell and... scraped them really badly?” Duo smiles stiffly. “I’m fine, though! It’s nothing!”

“Liar,” Quatre mutters.

“I’m not lying!” Duo protests. “You know I don’t lie!”

Quatre narrows his eyes. “Okay, then what part of the truth are you not telling me?”

“...Can I just tell you later? It’ll make more sense then.”  
“No.”

Duo hangs his head. Quatre loosens his grip, but only slightly.

“I promise, Quat, nothing’s wrong. I just had a few accidents,” Duo says, voice lowered. “It’s not for nothing, I swear.”

“You haven’t been in any danger?” Quatre asks softly.

“Any and all cuts and scrapes are my fault, sir,” Duo snarks through clenched teeth.

“Nobody’s making you say this, are they? To get you to keep quiet or something?”  
“If you’re talking about G and Howard - you know them - they’re good guys. They’ve been teaching me how to… build stuff.”

“‘Build stuff’?” Quatre blinks. 

Duo tries to pull his hand out of Quatre’s. It doesn’t work, and he can’t keep himself from wincing at the pain.

“You don’t have to be so paranoid, Quat. I’m not gonna swear to God ‘cause mom said not to, but I promise - all this...” Duo gestures with his free hand, “It’s just for a silly project.”

“Is that what you’ve been spacing out about all day?”

“...Yeah,” Duo admits with a sigh.

Quatre squints. “...If it’s just a ‘silly project,’ how come you told your mom not to let me near the garage? What’s such a big secret that I can’t see it ‘yet’?”

Duo claps his free hand against his own face. That last word shouldn’t have been there.

“ _Mom_...” he groans, leaning against the back of the bench, leaving his other hand to rest in Quatre’s. “I didn’t think she’d tell you that much.”

Quatre follows suit in leaning back, still maintaining a loose hold on his best friend.

The two boys sit in silence as the bench gently rocks back and forth. Gently, the breeze rustles the trees’ leaves.

“Well, one thing hasn’t changed, at least,” Quatre finally says. Duo raises a brow.

“When you find something to work on, that’s all you ever pay attention to,” Quatre mutters, lightly squeezing Duo’s hand.

Duo inhales sharply.

“...Quat?” he asks tentatively.

“...Sorry,” the blond apologizes. “I just...”

“I dunno,” he chuckles. “I thought we’d get to spend more time together since it’s summer and all that.”

“We’ve got a whole month left to go, y’know,” Duo offers, hesitant. “A week more than a month, actually.”

“Yeah. I know. I’m just being a drama queen,” Quatre laughs bitterly at himself. Duo watches, pressing his lips into a firm line.

Quatre turns to him with a weak smile. “Sorry. Your business is your business, and my business is mine. I won’t pry any further,” he says softly. Duo hears his voice break towards the end of his statement.

Quatre stiffens when he feels Duo squeeze back.

“The project is for you,” Duo’s breath hitches as he speaks. Quatre’s eyes widen, taken off guard.

“Huh…?”

“It’s for you, but it’s not done yet,” Duo repeats. “I don’t want you to see it yet ‘cause it’s embarrassing, but I promise you’ll get to see it once it’s done.” 

“Maybe a little bit sooner if I can get it to look right,” he adds. Quatre doesn’t say anything, but the look on his face is enough to get Duo flustered.

“It’s, uh...” Duo hesitates. “You remember that picnic a few weeks ago?” He knew Quatre did - he’d made an important confession then.

Quatre feels his face burning, and he looks away after he nods. He can only hope that the orange light from the porch masks the redness creeping across his cheeks. Duo looks away, too.

“On the way back home, you said you wanted something better to carry our stuff in when we went out, right?” he asks. “That’s what I’m working on.”

“A wagon...?” Quatre looks back at him, eyes sparkling with excitement. Slowly, Duo nods.

“I’ll wait,” Quatre beams. “I’ll wait however long you want!”

“I’ll let you know when it starts looking proper,” Duo says with a small smile.

“So no more secrets?” Quatre asks.

“No more secrets,” Duo nods.

Quatre offers up a pinky. “You promise?”

“I promise,” Duo swears, linking their digits together and completing the deal.

“Thank you,” Quatre laughs softly, leaning on Duo's shoulder.

Gently, Duo pulls him into a hug.

“Love you, Quat.”  
“I love you too.”


End file.
